The theft of the works, which had been on show since December 30 last year at the Vittoriale degli Italiani (The shrine of victories of the Italians), was noticed by the managers of the venue.
They claim that when they opened the doors in the morning, they found all the exhibition spaces empty.
The Cultural Heritage Protection Unit of the Carabinieri, Italy’s crack art cops, are investigating.
The exhibition, Like A Hot And Fluid Gold, The Golds of Umberto Mastroianni, was curated by Alberto Dambruoso on the basis of a project by Cigno GG, and held at the Museo d’Annunzio Segreto.
The famed sculptor was the uncle of screen legend Marcello Mastroianni.
The show featured rings, bracelets, brooches, pins, other jewels, and sheets of metal and sculptures fashioned by the sculptor between the 1950s and the 1990s with the technique of ‘lost wax’ or ‘golden stream’ melding.
The Vittoriale degli italiani is a hillside estate in the town of Gardone Riviera overlooking Lake Garda in province of Brescia, in Lombardy.
It is where poet and novelist D’Annunzio lived after his defenestration by Mussolini in 1922 until his death in 1938.
References to the Vittoriale range from a “monumental citadel” to a “fascist lunapark”, the site inevitably inheriting the controversy surrounding its creator.
ANSA
